Tuesday, Feb. 15, 2011
The Terminator
The Terminator and its sequels were the archetype of the man-vs.-machine clash. Initially set in a postapocalyptic future where the remnants of a beleaguered humanity hold out against a legion of robots bent on their total annihilation, the series brings the story back — through various feats of time travel — into the present. There, a robot assassin, in the bulky, inhuman shape of Arnold Schwarzenegger, is sent to kill the woman who will give birth to a man destined to lead mankind against the coming robot onslaught. What follows is bone-crushing, exoskeleton-melting mayhem — an epic dose of man-on-machine ultraviolence that rendered Schwarzenegger not just a governor, but a Governator.